Mother treats me, her 40 year old son like he is a child. Why does she do this?

I am very capable and educated, but currently unemployed and need retrained. i have always been a high earner. but my mother often makes me feel small and treats me as though I have no common sense. I am blessed with common sense and always held key positions in companies my whole work life. She forces her input upon me and it is usually elementary and it is insulting to me for her to think i have not thought of the obvious. She also is a bit of a martyr when I put my wife and kids before her. She has been widowed for some years and I am her only son She builds controls into favors that she does. She writes down every penny that is borrowed, even 10.00 when you forget our wallet. She is well off, worth $1M.and lives frugally with no bills. I have complained that even in crisis mode (serious crisis, like now, my wife is a danger to my children), my mother has an empty house that I asked to move my sons and I into for 90 days and she builds a lot of strings into letting us move there as a refuge while I divorce my violently mentally ill wife. She says that i have to sit down and she has to spell out how she wants the house kept if we are to live there. She also demands to sit my sons down and instruct them on expectations of them as far as cleanliness and such. I feel that is my role to communicate to my 11 year old twins, not her. She just builds so many strings and controls into any favor or gift that she might provide. I would never ask unless it were dire, and it effects her grandchildrens' well-being. She constantly inserts her agenda into my life by putting notes in my car or mailing me articles on subjects that she feels are inmportant, but that I have handled with common sense. She admitted that she add strings because she said the other day "In order to get strings, one has to come with me with a need first...so it woudl serve you best not to have needs." this is all in the middle of a bad state for jobs, they deliver government food relief trucks here it is so bad. I can't take the kids elsewhere to a work state because my soon to be ex-wife has a say as to where the kids live, and I have routinely worked as a succesful real estate agent, house flipper and contract computer programmer. All these markets ar soft right now due to outsourcing and the real estate market. I need to finalize divorce for kids' sake and the get retrained. i onoy need to live in this vacant house that has beenon the markey for over year with no offers. it is a small farm house. She is using controls on me, versus meeting the temporary needs of the grandchildren. She likes to be the boss and make you feel it when she lends assistance like this...wants you to earn it with strings...she is never satisfied and denies any negative behaviors that she has...never let's you for get it. After much turmoil of her adding strings to allowing us to live in the vacant house, tonight she retracted the offer just as we told the kids we were divorcing and moving to this familiar family farm house. She cites issues between her and I as the reason for "not having business dealings like [me] living at the vacant farm house." I respoect that her assets are hers, but we nust need to have an address while we finalize the divorce and i get custody. By retracting the highly "strung".gift of letting the kids and i saty there for 60 days, my only recourse is to let my violently mentally ill wife have custody of the children. Also, I have been a telecomuting Mr. Mom for 7 years programming form home over the internet. they want to be with me. Their mother cuts herself in fits of uncontrollable rage. I am broke due to her overspending too which compounds my financial situation. I am broke, but always earned a great living. My impulsive wife slowly raided our savings over the years. She kept the bills. She is sane 49% of the time. I feel my mother should let us live there for 60 days and seal the deal on me getting custody. My wife agrees to me having custody. She does nto feel fit. I will find work somehow/some way in the 60 days we would stay at the vacant farm house. I was the one that dully remodeled it to perfection. I fix houses up, not destroy them. She treats me like a frat boy that will destroy the house or something. I am 0 years old for goodness sake and fighting for my kids while many men shirk their fatherly duties. And I am also a real estate agent and know the house needs to show well. Is my mother being unfair? .